Former public toilet site wins top architecture prize

Community projects were the big winners at the New South Wales Architecture Awards in Sydney last night.

The highest honour of the event, the Sulman Medal for Public Architecture, went to Collins and Turner for the Waterloo Youth Family Community Centre.

The site, which formerly housed a public toilet block, also received a Sustainable Architecture award.

The chair of the public architecture and urban design jury, Helen Lochhead, described the youth centre as edgy and innovative.

"It not only combines social sustainability, but environmental sustainability and turns something which was a real black hole in the local park into something which is a magnet and an attractor," Ms Lochhead said.

Darling Quarter won the Best Urban Design award and was commended for transforming Darling Harbour.

"It really engages with people of all ages so that you see kids there playing in the playground ... there's cafes and restaurants, there's workers there - it's alive day and night," Ms Lochhead said.

The Art Gallery of New South Wales won the Robert Woodward Award in Small Project Architecture for its forecourt upgrade, designed by Johnson Pilton Walker.

Judges said the upgrade design resolved the longstanding problem of providing equitable access to the gallery.